>...and the answer is, at least in California, it's effectively illegal.
Because your (prospective) neighbors are worried you're building a Section 8 slum that's going to crash the value of their own properties. The house is usually a family's biggest investment, so it's not really surprising people get testy when they see a potential threat.
> you can do an un-permitted remodel of your downstairs, add drains, pave over the soil filter, create a massive sewage flooding problem, and sf will do... nothing. But if you were to try to tear down a house and replace it with a properly engineered multi unit dwelling... are you kidding me?
This is a really good point. Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I think this applies to US in general; not just SF. Cities will never inspect your house unless you give them a reason (e.g. apply for a permit).
The main deterrents to un-permitted work are: 1) if you need to sell the house, buyers don't like unpermitted work, and 2) your neighbors can file a complaint.
They usually aren't it's an argument used to scare people into making housing stock replenishment more expensive and lock in property values.
I'm building a house now. I sent the county... A picture of a square on a map. No plans no inspections nothing. Fuck all that. I build based on what seems reasonable after a cool Busch Light and then I just do it without asking permission from anybody.
Half my county did the same. It's not rocket science, and the world here hasn't fallen apart or burned down. But you will be told the opposite to get locked into expensive contractors and corrupt inspectors and the cash extracting nightmare licensing and permitting systems that surround that.
And before anybody gets too excited... this is all 100% legal if you pick the right spot.
It's very common, especially in places like SF, for all the old buildings and neighborhoods that people actually like to be illegal to build if they were new.
Of course, in SF it's practically illegal to build anything under any circumstances if any of your neighbors decide they don't like it.
Interesting. It doesn't say they're illegal, it says they're illegal in Single Family suburbs. Its like they want the benefits of low density housing but somehow not do low density housing.
> These buildings aren't illegal to build because of safety reasons or any construction deficiencies - they are only illegal due to regulations called zoning laws that San Francisco passed to restrict the density of housing in certain areas, originally to keep poor minorities out of white neighborhoods.
I genuinely don't get the point. Of course the buildings aren't legal under current zoning laws. They weren't built under current zoning laws! We don't tear down every skyscraper whenever the earthquake requirements change. Nobody moves their house when the setback requirement goes from 8' to 12'. These kinds of articles are tautological.
edit: the article mentions "illegal neighborhoods and illegal houses" but doesn't say anything about the laws when they were built.
It’s pretty simple. If I own property, I should be allowed to build a home for myself on it, subject to relevant zoning. You, and adjacent property owner, should not be able to deny my private property use.
I'm not quite following the article. Why can't people build a duplex like that today? Which part of it is illegal? I think it has something to do with a zoning law, but I'm not very familiar with the concept. (I live in Tokyo.)
Where’d this nonsense that the only thing you can build in the US is SFH come from? All over the US, in the same areas where there are SFH, there are apartment complexes, condos, and townhouses. The reason there’s so much SFH in the US is because, believe it or not, many people prefer living in a detached home with some semblance of a yard.
Seems from the article he wants to build something that doesn't adhere to local code restrictions on height and size limits.
It seems to be a part of the human condition to want to say "we should make these rules!" and then say "but I don't mean for me" It's just that people with a lot of money have more options when it comes to that second part.
This take is completely ignorant of the history around this. It is illegal to build anything other than single-family homes in many places in US cities. This is due to an (often-racist) history of homeowners creating laws to keep lower-income people out of their neighborhoods. This continues to this day, where many NIMBY homeowners will fight tooth and nail to prevent any kind of dense development being built in their neighborhood.
I don't buy it, dude. In the towns around where I live in SoCal, it is totally legal to raze a single family house and build up to 4 units in its place. The problem is the extra capacity gets built out at such a slow pace that it's just a drop of water in a hot frying pan.
lol my landlord is actually planning to do that with the house I'm living in after we move out, whenever we decide to do that.
It's just a matter of degree. You're drawing an arbitrary line here. Nobody is prohibiting anybody from construction, they're prohibiting certain types of construction. You can build a house, it just has to follow the rules and guidelines that the community has established.
It's a pretty common thing in the United States. There are historical neighborhoods for example. People pay a lot of money to live in these neighborhoods. You can't just waltz in and tear down an expensive house and turn it into a property with a couple of trailers on it.
The area has housing problems, no doubt about it, I'm not arguing that they don't, but there is clear legal, and social precedent for establishing rules for communities throughout the United States.
Because your (prospective) neighbors are worried you're building a Section 8 slum that's going to crash the value of their own properties. The house is usually a family's biggest investment, so it's not really surprising people get testy when they see a potential threat.
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